My Poo Stinks

I had a horrific experience the other day. While driving my car down Veteran, after having eaten a relatively light meal (Shabu-Shabu), a sudden horror dawned on me: oh my God, I have to take a dump. Now, to be quite honest, there wasn’t that much further for me to travel before I got back to my apartment; however, if you know anything about me, I don’t have that much time from the moment of the “uh-oh” realization, to the moment where I have to evacuate the feces from my colon.

Well, actually I guess it depends on the “type” of dump that it is. You know, there are different types of dumps that you take. There are the long, solid it feels soo good coming out of your anus because it’s in one unbroken unified whole dump that really leave you feeling satisfied. Then, there are the explosive ones that literally shoot out of your butthole, splattering onto the porcelyn “inanimate object”, poo that’s mixed in with gas explosions heard from everyone outside. There’s BDS dumps (‘nough said about that one). There are the encore dumps, the ones where you think you got it all out the first time but right when you wipe, flush, and step out of the bathroom, the sudden horror of “oh crap, I gotta go again” feelings hit you. Your body has a mind of its own, and depending on the type of dump that it is also correlates with the amount of time needed before you accidently crap your own pants.

Today, I did not have much time. Methane was mercilessly pushing against the feces, and it wanted to come out in a hurry. Thomas was sitting next to me, talking to me about God knows what, but the last thing that I wanted to do was talk. I need to focus and invest all my energy into stalling the inevitable. “Thomas, you have to shut up,” I half-seriously said, “I gotta take a dump!” Suddenly it seemed like all the red lights were against me. I hit every cross section, praying to God with desperate determination, “Oh Please Lord, let it be green!” It seems that God has a sense of humor: every light was red. And not just red, but you know the “it just turned red” type of red.

Now, half frustrated and doubting whether or not God REALLY does answer prayers, sweat started to accumulate around my forehead, and I knew there wasn’t much time left. “Thomas, I’m sorry, but you’re going to have to park my car.” Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, we got back to the apartment, as I sped through the narrow streets, oblivious and careless of any cops that may have been roaming the streets that day.

Relief; I just might make it after all! I ran up to the front door, expecting one of my roommates to be home, but TODAY. No, TODAY would be different. Today, God would look at me from heaven and laugh in mischievous delight, as I buzzed the door, dancing around in anguish anticipation, angry at my roommates for not being home (almost as if it were their fault). As I got closer to the bathroom, I became more desperate to release this tension that was building up ever so urgently in my butthole: I hate it how your body anticipates the bathroom, and begins to “prepare” to release the package when it realizes you are close to a toilet.

I ran back to the car, pinching my buttcheeks as hard as I possibly could, where Thomas had just switched into the driver seat. “Thomas! I need my keys,” I said as I grabbed the keys from my own car, leaving him stranded, immobile and with a quizzical smile on his face. I ran to the door, knowing that I didn’t have much time left, and fumbling the keys, I finally got both the outside door and the inside door open. “Oh my God, I may not make it,” the sudden horror dawned on me. I ran for my life for the bathroom. The moment I got in, I pulled down my pants and boxers, my cell phone flew out of my jacket pocket and landed somewhere on the floor, I positioned my butt over the toilet and even before I sat down the explosive force of the erupting volcano called “Mianus” spewed molten hot feces out of my colon, and splattered everywhere in the confinements of the beautiful invention called the toilet. “Oh, Lord. Thank You, Jesus,” I said with a sigh of relief. The funny thing is, I saw my cellphone on the floor, and I was kind of sad that the cellphone didn’t end up INSIDE the toilet. Why? That would be one HELL of a story to tell, eh?

Man, you would think with all these poo stories I seem to be sharing, I would be skinnier. But alas, this is not so; instead of having a buff, trimmed and cut six pack to post pictures of myself shirtless on the internet, I have a third breast plopped right in the center of my stomach, with an inverted nipple. You may never look at pot bellies the same again.

I looked down at the culprit of my agony–”Oh, wow, there’s a peanut in there? And what’s this red stuff? Where did that come from. Hmm. What did I eat for lunch?” Oh well. Whatever, I carefully wiped whatever remains clinged to my a-hole, flushed the toilet, and went back to rescue stranded and lonely Thomas.

The moment Thomas walked into my room, and near the bathroom, I only heard one thing from him. “Oh my Gosh, Sam! Your poo freaking stinks!” I smiled with a slight hint of satisfied delight: you get to suffer with me a little bit, I mischievously think. And there it is. I found out afresh, to my horror, my poo does stink after all.

First and foremost, isn’t it great how bathroom humor just never fails to elicit some sort of laughter? It NEVER gets old. You can hear a thousand stories exactly the same as the one above, but everytime you hear a story related to some sort of poo experience, you laugh? Maybe it’s because you have your own share of poo stories. Maybe it’s because secretly, you delight in the sufferings of others. I don’t know what it is, it’s always funny.

But I don’t share this story to really point at the hilarity of the situation. I share this story, actually to point out a rather significant (and maybe perhaps something that may be inferred as a bit of a stretch if not for some “poetic license” on my own part) reality: everyone’s poo stinks. No matter who you are, whether you are a girl (sorry, as much as you want to think it smells like roses, it DOESN’T. Trust me, I have a sister) or a guy (especially you men who eat tons of meat), your poo stinks.

No surprise, right? I guess intrinsically, we all sort of knew this, but for many of us, we never get that intimate with each other to actually experience it; most of you will probably never know that my poo does, in fact, stink. Of course, you may infer this reality, drawing upon comparisons to your own experiences with your own poo, but you will probably never actually be the lucky individual to walk into the bathroom after I have tactfully exploded unga (korean for poo) all over the place. Too bad for you, I know you want to.

I’m going to transition here a little bit, and talk about something that’s been on my heart and that Alyson addressed as well in her own sharing on Sunday. It was in the reference of me, and just to clear up any confusion or misinterpretation, I want to say first and foremost that this post isn’t really talking about the situation (the blogposts) that happened, so please get that thought immediately out of your mind. Rather, I’m talking about in general: the closer you get with someone, the more and more you realize that they aren’t actually perfect. This is especially true when you start dating: you always feel like the first moments of blissful romance will somehow carry on forever and ever, but it doesn’t. Want proof? Look at your parents. Of course they love each other, but it’s different. It’s weathered and mature.

And we find out in life, that the closer we get to people, the more we realize that they have their flaws and faults. The thing is, we often find out more about their beauty and genuineness, too, but somehow it always seems that the negative things are the things we choose to focus on. Why this is, I’m not sure. Maybe it’s because we expect everyone around us to be perfect, and ourselves to be perfect as well. Maybe we impose false expectations on people. Whatever the case, maybe we need to learn to appreciate the beautiful things about each other before judging the negative things?

You know, the truth is, in our families, we are fully aware of this reality. With your mom, dad and sister, you know they have a lot of beautiful aspects to them. I love my mom, I love my dad, and I love my sister. Nothing will ever change that. But within that, I know they have more than their share of flaws. I’ve smelled their poo, and I know it stinks. But within the context of family (the immediate family), we force ourselves to always reconcile the situation: if I get into a fight with my parents, I know that it can’t stay that way. And I also know that I need to reconcile and fix the situation, that I can’t simply “ignore” what happened or even ignore the person, I need to make it work. I also know that I want to help my sister and family grow just as much as they want to help me: it’s a symbiotic understanding that we’re “in this together”, and if not family, then who else?

However, I find that oftentimes when it doesn’t involve my family, another harsh reality occurs. When we are faced with adversity, and the uglies of our friends come out, many times our natural inclination is to (instead of wanting to reconcile or address the situation), run away from it. Because you don’t have to deal with the situation, you reason within the context of your own intellectual thinking that it’d be much better and sensible to “avoid” and ignore the situation. I’m not just talking about “confrontations” here. I’m talking about the weaknesses and fallenness of others. When people “don’t have it all together”, and are obviously weak and struggle in certain areas, we tend to shrug it off, and not confront or help the person who’s struggling in the area. This extends to more than just personality flaws, but even things like discipline. When our friend is obviously living an undisciplined life, not praying or reading the Word, instead of rebuking and challenging the individual, we ignore the situation. And what’s worse, we talk and think about it behind their backs. “So and so is like this and like that, and I don’t understand why he’s like that…” You point the finger of accusation at the other, maybe cognitive of your own failures and struggles, but always feeling like you are justified for thinking the way that you are.

And it’s intrinsically built into you to simply avoid the conflict, and instead of dealing with the situation, you find a way to outcast that person from your own life, or from your own church: isn’t it much better to just run away and not have to deal with it?

So in doing simple church, we find ourselves in a similar predicament. After a matter of time, we realize this truth about each other: we aren’t perfect, after all. And there are going to be mistakes and flaws, and things that happen that of course is always the other person’s fault. However, what will our response be? Will we avoid the situation, turning and averting our eyes from the matter at hand? Or will we be the catalysts for change, praying dililgently and investing our hearts into refining each other, as iron sharpens iron. Will we face the enemy of controversy, and instead of shy away in comfortable horror, will we fight against the notion that “it’s okay”, and instead come to a conclusion within ourselves that we will not allow our friends to live their lives without the benefit of true spiritual community?

I write this fully guilty of many of the things I issue a challenge for–I am one who finds myself ignoring situations a lot of times instead of facing it head on. I ignore it because I don’t particularly want to make myself uncomfortable. But that’s selfish of me, and what’s more, it may leave a person unedified, unchanged, unsharpened. If a person’s struggle and uglies blossoms and shows itself in a “hard to handle” sort of way, isn’t it better to, as a people of believers and disciples of Christ, do everything in our own power to encourage, uplift, edify and bless the other who is struggling?

This is becoming long, and I haven’t really gotten it all out yet, and maybe I haven’t even completely wrapped my mind around this issue completely, but the only point I’m trying to make is this: everyone’s poo stinks. And maybe what we need to do is expand and extend our own mindset of what family is to beyond the simple 2.5 children, a mom and a dad, and include within that embrace of family others who so desperately and longingly desire for true community. Maybe we need to approach our friends and brothers and sisters in Christ like our family, fully aware that they aren’t perfect, but knowing that you need to show them grace, love and support in their imperfection. Maybe we need to not ignore the fallenness we see in each other, but challenge each other to become better men and women of God, unwilling to accept the realities, and push instead passionately for the ideals. Maybe we need to learn how to rebuke properly, without judgmental accusation, but out of love, tenderness and selfless humility. Maybe we need to learn how to receive it as well. I know I need to learn all of these things. Maybe we start really working toward it, and start with ourselves, instead of expecting others to take charge or lead the way. Maybe.

In the face of controversy, how will we handle it? I want to say that as a body of Christ, we need to do more than ignore it.